


I will never let go

by sicklyscribe



Series: Brothers [1]
Category: The Originals (TV)
Genre: Abusive Parents, Canon Compliant, Every Mother's Son, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-15
Updated: 2018-09-15
Packaged: 2019-07-12 19:21:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16001663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sicklyscribe/pseuds/sicklyscribe
Summary: “Elijah, do you recall the day Niklaus challenged your father to a duel?”- Esther,“Every Mother’s Son”





	I will never let go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ALostHeart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALostHeart/gifts).



> Written as a birthday gift for [klausmikelsons](http://klausmikelsons.tumblr.com) on tumblr.

The afternoon was a blur. Mikael came out of the woods, blood on his clothes and on his hands, and Elijah couldn’t remember seeing straight since. 

“Father, are you -” he had began, but Mikael shoved him aside, stalking towards the longhouse.

“Save your breath, boy. My wounds will heal.” He turned, and Elijah saw the flash of a smile as he added, “Can’t say the same for your runt of a brother.”

Mikael turned his back, and laughed. Elijah began to run. His father was yelling something, something he did not want to hear. 

And then he heard the screaming. 

“ _Niklaus!”_ He screamed back until he was hoarse, the woods caving in around him as he stumbled and sprinted in desperate bursts towards the sound of his brother’s voice. As he finally neared, as he began to hear the gasping, ragged breaths between the screams, Elijah managed a singled coherent thought:  _Father’s sheath was empty._

Mikael’s sword was the first thing he saw after thinking of it, a sick answer to the sickening question. As he walked around the tree blocking his vision, as he saw the place that joined the sword to a tree, he saw that  _place_  was his brother.

Elijah was choking on his own words, he wanted to tell Niklaus not to talk, not to move, but he himself was paralyzed. His little brother was looking at him, looking for his big brother to help him, but in that moment Elijah did not know if his own legs would carry him. The sword was through his chest and there was blood, and Niklaus couldn’t move, and Elijah knew he couldn’t move the sword… 

“Elijah,” Nik groaned, and seeing his brother’s hand move towards him snapped Elijah back to movement. He rushed to Niklaus’ side, squeezing his hand but moving it back so that his arm did not bend his shoulder, did not pressure the hole in his chest where their father’s sword was sheathed. 

There was a  _hole_ straight through his brother, and Elijah could not help him. “I have to…I have to get Mother…” He did not know that he was saying it, but the fear in Klaus’ eyes told him that it was not just in his thoughts.

“I don’t want her to know. I don’t…”

Elijah grabbed Niklaus’ neck - as gently as he could, considering - “Ayanna’s is too far. I’m getting Mother. One way or another, she will find out. But first she’s going to make sure you don’t bleed out against a tree.” 

Nik was protesting, but Elijah just gave his hand a final squeeze before running again. There was no time. There was so much blood…

Their mother was at the river, washing clothes, but when she saw her son bolt out of the woods and point to her, shouting hoarse nonsense, she dropped her husband’s wool shirt and ran to him.

“What happened, Elijah?” her son’s eyes flitted, couldn’t focus. She pulled him into a quick hug, but it didn’t seem to help. 

She put her hands on Elijah’s shoulders, steadying his wild rambling until finally he managed, “Niklaus, it’s Niklaus… Father tried to kill him. His sword, all the way through - no time, no - Please, Mother, I know Father said -”

“He said I was not to heal our sons from his discipline, or else share the punishment. Hear me now, Elijah. I would rather die than watch any of my children suffer.” She took his hand as his breathing began to steady. “Where is he?”

“I’ll take you-”

“No.” 

“Mother, I - “

“You will make sure your father does not leave the house until I return. Is that clear?” 

Elijah gulped. he wanted to argue but there was  _no time_. “Go south along the deerpath. You’ll hear - you’ll hear him.” 

Esther wiped a tear from his cheek that he hadn’t realized was there. She kissed his forehead, and ran in the direction that he had come. 

He had to go back to his father. He had to sit with that man and distract him - which meant he had to sit and listen to all the reasons Niklaus deserved a sword through the chest. 

His steps were heavy, but quick as he made his way back to the family home. It didn’t matter what he would have to endure. Niklaus was dying in the woods and if he had to listen to his killer brag in order to keep his little brother safe, he’d be the best listener in the world. 

* * *

 

When his mother finally returned, Elijah nearly jumped out of his skin. Mikael had long been asleep, drunk, and Elijah had been sitting at the table with his head in his hands. 

She beckoned him close, to whisper in his ear. “We cannot move him. Fetch a tent, and stay with him tonight. I will bring better medicines and magics in the morning. Keep him on his side, do not let him roll to his chest or his back. Make sure the wound is wrapped tight.” 

She fetched some scrap cloths from her sewing basket, and he clutched them in his hands, wringing them as he murmured, “Is he going to be all right?”

His mother looked at him sadly, and her gentle touch on his chin only made him feel as though the earth was swallowing him whole. “You came to me just in time. He should live. But even if his body recovers - he will never truly be all right.”

Elijah shook his head, unwilling to accept the truth in her words. He grabbed his pack of hunting supplies, hoisted the tent posts and tarp over his shoulder, and went to be with his brother. 

* * *

 

Night was falling as Elijah made his way to the bloody tree, and his bloody brother. He didn’t say a word, just began work on the tent as Niklaus watched from the ground. 

Mikael’s crowing laughter haunted him. His boasts that evening over his dinner had painted a graphic picture of each of the wounds Niklaus had suffered that day. Of how he had left him, pinned, telling him that he deserved to rot in the woods. Telling him that at least the flesh on his bones could be useful after he died, to the scavengers and the wolves. 

But Elijah had known well enough to fill in the gaps. To see the scabbing cuts on Mikael’s arm and leg as he bragged of his superiority, the blossoming bruises on his face and neck. Niklaus had fought a good fight. 

What Elijah could not understand was why his brother had chosen this day to fight, this day to make his challenge. 

What Elijah could not understand was why Niklaus had not told him what he was planning.

The young man secured the tent skins over the posts he’d secured, covering his brother just as raindrops began to fall. “Come now,” he said, kneeling at his brother’s side. “Let’s get you properly bandaged.” 

“I can sit up,” he said, but as he tried to spur his muscles to the act, he let out an involuntary yelp. 

“Here, brother,” Elijah placed one hand around Niklaus’ neck, and the other at the base of his back, and helped to pull him up. He tried to ignore the pool of blood on the ground under him. Niklaus was shuddering from the effort, clutching Elijah’s shoulder and taking labored, long breaths. 

The elder brother took the younger’s hands, once he was steadied, but one of them was slick with blood. Elijah looked down to see that Niklaus’ right hand was clutched into a fist, knuckles white and straining as they gripped a leather string… His starling necklace. 

Gently, wordlessly, Elijah pried his fingers open. 

“He tried to take it from me. Mikael. He cut it from my neck, and I…” 

Elijah took the necklace, putting in its place his own hand. “You fought him.”

“I’m such a fool, Elijah. I don’t know what came over me. I thought the fight was over before it began, but after he took Mother’s gift, I - I can’t explain it.”

The brothers sat for a moment; as one wrapped a thin cloth around the other’s palm; as the crickets took up their nightly song, “He’s all bruised and bloodied, passed out drunk on his furs.” Elijah shook his head. “I think you scared him today.” 

Klaus laughed, but each breath was a violent act, and he gripped his brother tighter as the waves of pain washed over him. “I scared myself more.”

 _You scared me the most,_ Elijah thought, tying the bandage. Before he moved on to the stab wound, though, Elijah placed the necklace back into Klaus’ hand, and curled his brother’s fingers back over the strings. 

A palpable dread fell over Elijah as he cut open his brother’s shirt, and began clearing away the moss dressings with quick, gentle hands. He wanted to scream, he wanted to shake his brother by the shoulders and ask him how he could have been so foolish as to issue challenge their father, to seek out his brutality.  _Hadn’t Klaus had enough of Mikael’s brutality to last him ten lifetimes?_

Instead, he begged his hands to be steady as he cleaned the blood and ooze and dirt from the hole in his brother’s chest. When he started padding and wrapping the wound, Klaus’ eyes began to gloss over in pain. 

“Brother,” Elijah said sharply, “Stay with me. Nearly done.” He tied the first bandage snugly, and Klaus howled in agony. Elijah unrolled an old wool blanket behind Klaus, and lowered him down on his side. The bandage at the exit wound was already starting to seep pink and red. Niklaus’ head lolled, pillowed on his arm, and his eyelids were heavy, lashes wet with tears and sweat and just a bit of blood, from the small cut on his forehead. 

Elijah ripped a scrap from the corner of a bandage, and cleaned Niklaus’ cold brow as he drifted into sleep.

–

The storm was not strong, but it was loud. Thunder and lightning ensured Elijah would not sleep for long, even if he wasn’t woken half a dozen times an hour by the need to see if Niklaus was still breathing.

This time, though, it was a crash of Thor’s hammer that jolted him awake, and when he turned to see if Klaus was still sleeping soundly, his heart caught in his chest. 

Niklaus was quietly quaking beside him, shuddering with silent tears dripping down his cheeks and nose. Elijah sat up, reached for him, tried to catch his gaze… but Niklaus did not seem to see him, did not seem to feel his hand on his arm. 

“Niklaus,” Elijah tapped his shoulder. Then again. Harder. “Brother!” 

He was still breathing. He was not awake, but he was not asleep. Elijah splattered water over Klaus’ face, which made him twitch. Elijah did it again. And again. “BROTHER!” 

Another crash of thunder rang as he yelled, and the elements and his desperation combined snapped a sort of sense into Niklaus’ gaze. “‘Lijah,” he mumbled, “what’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong is that you challenged Father!” Elijah was yelling before he knew what he was saying, and as the words fell from him he heard the tears in his voice - “You stood before him and you asked for this, you asked -”

“I asked for  _respect!”_ Klaus spat through his teeth, trying not to jostle himself. “What is this, Elijah?”

“You challenged him,” Elijah could not recall ever sounding so pathetic. 

“I knew you would never understand.”

“You didn’t tell me, you didn’t say a word-”

“You would have stopped me!”

“YES I would have stopped you! I would have tied you down if I had to, if you had trusted me, if you had cared…”

Klaus scoffed, and spat out a bit of blood before responding. Elijah tightened his grip on his brother’s shoulder. “I knew you would make this all about how terrible I am. I get it, I’m a fool, I’m an embarrassment, a disapp-”

“For fuck’s sake, Niklaus!” Elijah wrung his hands with the maddening frustration - “You have NEVER been a disappointment to me!”

Both the brothers realized Elijah was crying at the exact same time. 

“Niklaus, I can’t do this. I can’t walk into the woods and find you dying, I can’t do it. And it’s Father’s fault. It’s always Father’s fault. But this time, you sought him out. You asked for his violence, and  _stop looking at me like that!_  You  _DID!_  You challenged him, and he left you to die! If I hadn’t been home, if I had gone with Kol and Finn on that hunt, if I… Who would’ve… What would’ve…”

He could not seem to breathe properly. The sobs ripped through the air in the small tent, and through the young mens’ souls. 

Klaus could not look at him when he said it. “I need him to respect me, Elijah.”

The elder brother lay down - collapsed, really - beside him, face scrunched with fear and anger and tears. “Don’t you know that _I_ need  _you?_  To be…To be here?” he gulped, “to be alive?” 

The disbelief on Klaus’ face made Elijah feel as though a sword had been struck through his own chest - how could he not know? “Niklaus… We can’t escape our father.” he sighed, shaking his head as new tears fell. “But I always thought I could trust that we would  _survive_ him.” 

Niklaus was breathing heavily, but from an entirely different kind of shock. 

Elijah found there was so much he needed to say, so much he  _needed_  Niklaus to believe about how much he mattered, about how much he was loved, about how worthless their father truly was. But when he opened his mouth to speak, he found he could manage no more than the simplest, strongest truth he’d ever known. “ _You’re my brother._ ”

And he didn’t need to say those thousand other things, he didn’t need to say something clever or eloquent or wise. It was all there, every endless messy absolute bit of it, in those three words.

Niklaus had been pinned today, pinned literally by his father’s rage, stuck in the all-consuming agony of his disgust. When Esther had drawn out the knife, he did not feel free, he felt lost. Drowning in air, in blood, in waves of worthlessness and despair.

“ _You’re my brother,”_  Elijah whispered this time, with barely a hint of breath. 

The boy with the hole in his chest unfurled his grip on his mother’s pendant, reaching slowly, painfully across the small gap between them as the starling clattered to the forest floor. He could not manage to reach Elijah’s shoulder, and so his hand fell against his chest. Elijah took it in his own, gripped it so tightly the cuts on his palm threatened to open. But this pain was nothing, compared to the hole. 

Elijah leaned his head to rest against his brother’s, eye to eye, as a precious feeling began to beat within his brother’s heart. He had been pinned, he had been lost, he had been drowning…But in this moment, beyond the pain, beyond the fear of tomorrow and the horror of all the days that came before, head to head against the world, Niklaus finally felt secure.


End file.
